


good fun

by thistidalwave



Category: Radio 1 RPF
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-03-03
Updated: 2013-03-03
Packaged: 2017-12-04 04:13:17
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,226
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/706408
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thistidalwave/pseuds/thistidalwave
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Five times Nick and Ian fake dated and the one time it was real.</p>
            </blockquote>





	good fun

**Author's Note:**

> written for Dauphine! <33 (and because the internet needed some ian/nick)
> 
> you'd think i shouldn't have to say this, but please don't post a link to this story in any of the characters' tags on tumblr or in an @ reply on twitter. ty.

.1

When Ian gets into the studio just after eight on a nondescript late October morning, Nick immediately waves him over and informs the nation that “Ian’s here! Hey, Ian, want to go to a party with me tonight? Finchy told me no.”

“Finchy said no to the party or no to going with you?” Ian asks when he’s made his way over to a mic. 

“Both,” Matt says. 

“To going with me,” Nick says, rolling his eyes at Matt. “We’re not going to go give it the big one, Finchy, it’s a very classy fashion industry soiree.” 

“Uh huh,” Matt deadpans. Fiona snorts. 

“What do you need me to go with you for, then?” Ian asks. 

“So I don’t have to be lonely, Ian,” Nick says.

“He needs a babysitter,” Matt counters. 

“Heeeeey,” Nick protests, then pauses for a loaded moment before saying, “Yeah, I do.” He hits play on a record and takes off his headphones. “Really, though, I don’t want to go to this party.”

“Nick Grimshaw not wanting to go to a party? What has the world come to?” LMC asks.

Nick makes a face at her. “It’d be fine except for how my ex is going to be there,” he complains. 

“We know,” Matt says long sufferingly, which means Nick’s been going on about it all morning. Ian appreciates his later start time even more on days like today. 

“Why is that a problem?” Ian asks. “Don’t you usually stay friends with everyone you’ve ever met?”

“Not when they decide they hate me,” Nick says. “This is why I stick to one night stands with fit models; it never works out when I shag them more than once. Now I’m going to have to deal with him secretly gloating and pretending to be sympathetic about how I don’t have a plus one.”

He looks proper dejected about it, Ian thinks, or maybe just worried or annoyed. Ian’s never been too good with reading facial expressions, but it’s definitely some sort of negative emotion. Nick’s tapping his fingers against the desk, avoiding eye contact by watching the countdown clock, and Ian’s not sure what it is about that that makes him open his mouth again, but he does. “I could actually go with you if you want. I’m free tonight.”

Nick’s head snaps up, and he looks at Ian incredulously. Matt raises his eyebrows questioningly from where he’s standing behind Nick. “What?” 

“I’ll be your plus one, and then you won’t look like you’re pining or all that,” Ian says. 

Nick narrows his eyes. “Really? People will think we’re dating. There’ll be pictures.”

Ian shrugs. “So?”

Matt is slowly shaking his head at Ian, and he thinks he can see Fiona staring at him from the other side of the desk, but there’s a smile tugging at the edges of Nick’s mouth, and Ian thinks it’s not so bad to give up a night of sitting in his flat watching telly to cheer Nick up a bit. It’s not like it’s not going to be fun, anyway.

“You’re sure?” Nick asks.

“Yeah, why not? Besides, someone _does_ need to keep you in line.”

“Oh, piss off,” Nick says, but he’s proper smiling now as he turns to let Matt point out something on his script to him.

“You sure that was a good idea?” LMC asks quietly when Ian goes around to the other side of the desk. 

“Yeah,” he says, and resolutely ignores the doubtful face LMC makes at him.

-

“That’s him,” Nick says, gesturing inconspicuously across the room. Ian follows the gesture and immediately spots a man with truly terrifying cheekbones talking with someone Ian thinks might be a designer. 

“Far too ugly for you,” Ian says.

Nick laughs. “No need to lie,” he says. “That’s a man who is paid to look pretty.”

“So are you,” Ian says. “I mean, when you do the telly sometimes. Sort of.”

Nick stares at him, then shrugs. “Sure.” He glances up and then frowns, raising a hand in a lazy wave. “He’s coming this way,” he says quietly. “Look boyfriendy.” 

_Boyfriendy,_ Ian thinks to himself and resists the urge to laugh hysterically. Instead, he shifts closer to Nick so that there’s barely any space between them and only laughs a little. Nick grins at him. Ian hopes it gives off couple-laughing-together vibes.

“Hi, Nick,” ex-boyfriend says, and Nick takes a moment before he looks over.

“Hi,” he says, taking a sip of his drink. “How are you?” 

“I’m good, thank you. How have you been?” He’s positively simpering, and Ian can’t seem to look away from his cheekbones.

“I’ve been doing great,” Nick says. “Have you met Ian?”

“I don’t believe I have,” ex-boyfriend says, but he doesn’t bother to say his own name or stick out his hand for Ian to shake. 

“Nice to meet you,” Ian says, holding out his own hand because he refuses to stoop to being equally rude. “I work with Nick on the radio.”

Ex-boyfriend barely shakes Ian’s hand before letting it drop. “So are you two--”

“Together?” Nick asks. “Yeah.” He settles his arm around Ian’s back, and Ian does his best not to jump and relaxes into Nick’s side.

Ex-boyfriend nods and changes the subject, and Ian takes that as his cue to stop paying attention. He stares into his drink and makes the executive decision to knock the rest of it back immediately. Being Nick Grimshaw’s fake boyfriend is entirely too stressful. He doesn’t even want to think about what it might be like to be his actual boyfriend. (He’s considered it briefly before, but it always seems a dark path best abandoned.)

“Nice to see you,” Nick is saying, and Ian lets himself be steered away by Nick’s arm. “I need so much alcohol,” Nick says into Ian’s ear.

Ian agrees with that, but, “Matt will have our heads if we’re hungover tomorrow, and I don’t think your culturally relevant excuse counts in this case.”

“I wasn’t going to say it’s culturally relevant,” Nick says. “Emotionally relevant, maybe.”

“Still not going to work.”

“I’m loathe to admit that you’re right,” Nick says. They’ve made it to the bar, and Nick pushes their empty glasses across it and gestures to the bartender. “At least you make a cute fake boyfriend.”

“Aw,” Ian deadpans, “thanks.”

Nick shrugs and is quiet until they get their drinks. He turns to Ian and holds his glass out to him. “Thanks for doing this,” he says. “You didn’t have to.”

Ian takes his drink. “I wanted to,” he says. “Toast?”

Nick clinks his glass against Ian’s, and they knock back half their drinks. Nick grins at Ian, and Ian smiles back. Yeah, he thinks, no regrets. 

.2

Ian is more drunk than he is sober, and he’d really only come over to the bar to get another round for the team (and to get away from LMC’s attempt at rapping), so he’s not really sure how he ended up chatting to this blonde, only that he is. 

Her name is Georgia, and it’s a wonder that Ian even caught that, really, considering the amount of attention he’s paying to whatever she’s saying now. (It’s not much.) He can’t figure out a nice way to let her down, though, so he’s stuck here nodding while she tells a story about the time her brother played a prank on her. 

This is about the third story along this vein. Ian thinks she might need to try being more cautious around her brother. He can’t figure out a nice way to say that, either.

If she’d just stop talking, he thinks desperately, he could say he has to get back to the people he’s with. Why won’t she stop talking?

“Ian, darling! Where’d you get off to?” Nick appears beside him, throwing an arm around his shoulders. “Who’s this?”

“This is Georgia,” Ian says. “Her brother isn’t very nice to her.”

“Hi, Georgia,” Nick says. “I’m Nick. Ian’s boyfriend.”

“Oh!” Georgia says, looking a bit stunned. Ian feels quite the same. “Sorry, I didn’t realise.”

“Not a problem, love. My Ian’s too nice for his own good, aren’t you?”

Ian nods. “Sorry. It was nice talking to you.”

Georgia nods back at him. She doesn’t look too emotionally damaged, which is nice as it means Ian doesn’t need to feel too guilty about lying to her. 

“Ready to go back to the table?” Nick asks. He presses a kiss to Ian’s temple, and Ian’s heart flutters in his chest. He chooses to ignore it. 

“Has LMC stopped rapping?” 

“Thankfully yes,” Nick says. 

“Then lead the way.”

Nick keeps his arm around Ian’s shoulders as they make their way across the room. The warm weight of it is nice, and Ian’s ignoring that as well. “If anyone asks,” Nick announces as they sit back down at the table, “Ian and I are dating.”

“All right then,” Fiona says. “That’s normal.”

“This is becoming a trend,” Matt says speculatively. 

“Is this how you’ve decided to celebrate your one month anniversary?” LMC asks.

“Fuck off,” Nick says. “Ian’s terrified deer eyes were becoming too much for me, I had to do something.”

“Glad you think I look like a deer,” Ian says sarcastically.

“Aw, is baby offended?” Nick coos, nuzzling his face into Ian’s neck.

“I’m not nearly drunk enough for this,” Fiona says, verbalising Ian’s exact thoughts. 

“You didn’t even bring the next round like you were supposed to,” LMC points out.

Nick licks Ian’s neck and giggles. “Fuck,” Ian says. Everyone looks like they thoroughly agree. 

.3

It isn’t that Ian had meant to be Nick’s date for the Christmas party. Technically, he’s definitely not Nick’s date. They’d just sort of ended up showing up at the same time because they’d been texting, and there was maybe a running joke over the past week or two, and both Ian and Nick are too busy drinking wine and socialising to bother correcting any assumptions people might have made. 

“I think a sound engineer just asked me how long we’ve been together,” Nick says, slumping down against the wall Ian’s leaning on. 

“Yeah? What’d you say?”

“Two months,” Nick says, grinning lazily. “That’d be right, wouldn’t it?”

“Spose so,” Ian says. “Other than how we’re not.”

Nick waves the hand that’s not holding a bottle of wine dismissively. “It’s good fun.”

It’s those words that are running through Ian’s head a good couple hours later, when Annie and Aimee have accosted them in a corner with mistletoe and are demanding they kiss. Does Nick still think it’s good fun? He probably does if the way he’s laughing at Aimee means anything. Does Ian think it’s good fun? He’s not sure, because Nick certainly does look kissable, but is that the wine talking? Does Ian normally want to kiss Nick? He can’t remember.

He doesn’t have anymore time to think about it, either, because Nick’s crawling into Ian’s lap and pressing their lips together, his hands cupping the sides of Ian’s face softly, and Ian settles his own hands on Nick’s hips and melts into it. Kissing Nick is warm and a bit sloppy, and Ian wouldn’t mind letting it happen for the rest of time, really. 

It would be a bit heavy to realise, especially since Ian can turn into a maudlin drunk at the drop of a hat, but somehow Ian feels very light, like Nick is breathing helium into his lungs and they’re going to float away together. 

“Good fun,” he breathes when Nick pulls away, and Nick laughs, resting his forehead against Ian’s. 

“Funny that we’ve not done that before,” Nick murmurs.

“Shame, really,” Ian says. 

Nick looks delighted. “Repeat performance?”

“Still under mistletoe, aren’t we?” 

“Touché, Chaloner,” Nick says, and kisses him again.

.4

It’s Laura-May’s idea, because of course it is. 

Nick and Ian are sitting across from each other on the train, eating Pringles and kicking each other under the table, when LMC declares “Picture time!” from across the aisle.

Ian raises his eyebrows. “Can’t a man eat his crisps in peace?”

“No,” LMC says, “a man cannot. Come on, look like a loving couple.”

“What do we need to do that for?” Ian asks.

“For lols, mainly,” LMC says. 

Nick sits forward in his seat and leans on the table, propping his chin up on one hand. He bats his eyelashes at Ian. “Stare into my eyes, baby,” he quips.

Ian sighs and leans over, resting his hand on Nick’s shoulder and staring at him. Nick makes an exaggerated kissy face, and Ian smirks. 

“There, good,” LMC says. 

“Magnetic aaaaarse,” Nick sings under his breath, and Ian bursts out laughing. 

It’s business as usual for them, and Ian doesn’t think anything of it until later, when they’re getting off the train and a lady standing beside them says to Nick, “It’s nice seeing young people like yourself in such happy relationships. Gives me hope for love in the world.”

Ian blinks, because he’s pretty sure things like that don’t happen outside of clichéd films. He’s about to protest, if not this point, then _something_ about the situation, when Nick says thank you to the lady and proceeds to have a lively conversation about his relationship with his boyfriend (Ian, apparently) until they have to part ways. 

“Folks are nice in Northern Ireland,” Nick says. Ian doesn’t know what to say to that, so he settles for not saying anything at all.

-

“People seem to think we’re together a lot,” Ian finally says, a good few hours and one work dinner later, when he and Nick are the only ones left at the table. 

“We do spend a lot of time together,” Nick says.

“I mean they think we’re dating,” Ian says. “Like, there are obviously those times we told people we were, or didn’t correct them, but then total strangers? Not even just that lady earlier.”

Nick shrugs. “Does it bother you?”

Ian frowns. It doesn’t, not really, but maybe it should. 

“I can tell people we’re not dating if it does,” Nick continues after a moment. “I can say it on air, if you like.”

Ian rolls his eyes. “It’s fine, honestly. Just a bit odd.”

Nick shrugs again. “Think I’m going to head up to my room.”

“Sure,” Ian says. He kind of wishes he’d stuck to not saying anything. That game plan was definitely working out better than this one.

.5

“So, that’s decided then,” Nick says. “Everyone’s coming to mine for a film night. We can make it a new monthly thing, yeah?”

“Yeah, all right,” Finchy says. 

“Fiona? LMC?” Nick asks. They both agree relatively enthusiastically into their mics. 

Ian has next to no clue how they came to this conclusion, because they did so in the link before he arrived, but that’s just convenient because it means he can ask and anyone who might have just tuned in will be clued in as well. Or so Producer Matt Fincham had briefed him.

“Ian?” Nick asks.

“What’s this about then?” Ian asks.

“Team bonding,” Nick says. “People have been saying we’ve got beef.”

“Like, you and me do?” Ian asks, his eyebrows furrowing. 

“Yes! I don’t know what show these listeners are tuning into--first me and Tina, now me and Ian. I just hate _everybody_.” He rolls his eyes.

“That’s just silly,” Ian says. “Of course I’ll be at yours tonight.”

“Good. Around seven?”

“Perfect,” Ian says, and Nick segues into an advert.

-

Ian texts Nick in the late afternoon to ask if he’s actually up for watching a film, and gets a response an hour later that enthusiastically confirms and demands that Ian bring food. 

Then Ian texts the team to ask if they’re going, and he gets a negative response from all three of them. He’s frowning at his phone and thinking that, despite Nick’s text, he should just beg off, when he gets a follow up text from Fiona that reads _You should go though!_

He frowns deeper and texts back _no one else is?_

Fiona texts back a string of emojis including a blushing smiley, a clock, and a hand applying pink nail polish. Ian wishes he worked on a team of less strange people. 

He takes the emojis as the encouragement he assumes they’re intended to be and only stops off at his flat long enough to change to a more comfortable jumper because the one he’s been wearing all day is irritating the skin at the back of his neck before walking to his favourite Chinese place to get takeaway. He catches a cab from there to Nick’s and ends up arriving a solid fifteen minutes early, which Nick will just have to deal with if he wants food that isn’t cold.

Nick doesn’t seem too bothered, greeting Ian at the door with a smile and a dog barking at his feet. “Did you bring food? Oh, you did, brilliant.” He takes the bags from Ian’s hands and walks away from the door, leaving Ian to come in and close the door behind him. He kicks off his trainers and follows Nick into the living room. 

“I didn’t really have an idea of what film to watch,” Nick says, “so we can just see what’s on Film4 and if it’s something terrible we can watch it anyway just for the pleasure of taking the piss. That’s more fun, anyway, you know I can’t pay attention to a film.”

“Yeah, I know,” Ian says, flopping down on one end of the sofa. “Find the orange chicken and pass it over here, will you?”

Nick does so, then frowns at the containers. “No one else is coming, right?”

“They all said they were busy,” Ian says. He’s braced for Nick to be even the slightest bit disappointed, but he just shrugs and picks up a container of fried rice, settling back into the sofa with it. 

“More for me,” Nick says. “More food, more Ian, more fun.”

Three quarters of the way through the (terrible) film, Ian has somehow, possibly by way of hysterical laughter and Nick trying to get him to eat a bit of noodles because he swore they tasted naff, found himself lying across Nick’s lap, Thurston curled up on his own, and his beer too far away for him to reach himself so Nick has to keep handing it to him. 

“Just hold on to it yourself, christ,” Nick complains.

“I don’t want to end up spilling it all over you when you make a comment about the cheerleader’s hair again,” Ian says. “Your jumper is much too soft to be marred by Corona.” This is a fact he knows well, because he’s been inconspicuously rubbing his cheek against it for the past fifteen minutes. 

“You’d know,” Nick says. Oh. Maybe not so inconspicuous, then. “Oh, look, she’s about to go admit her love for the bloke. Honey, not with that hair, have we learned nothing?”

Ian snorts a laugh, and Nick looks pleased, pushing his fringe out of his face only for it to flop back down a moment later. He’s watching the screen intently, shaking his head minutely with his lips pursed, and Ian is watching him. He finds himself doing that a lot, it seems, and maybe that should have been a clue, but it never really seemed to matter until Ian was doing it while lying in Nick’s lap in his flat, Nick’s dog on his legs and a stupid film playing on the telly.

 _Fuck,_ Ian thinks, because the past months are all falling into place in his mind, and he’s no stranger to this feeling in the pit of his stomach. He’s basically dating Nick, except how he’s not--which isn’t the problem. The problem is that he really kind of wants to be.

“Aw, true love,” Nick coos, and it takes a moment before Ian registers that he’s talking to the wide shot of the couple kissing that’s fading into the ending credits. 

“Adorable,” Ian says and pretends he means the television screen. 

+1.

Ian hangs out outside the studio Sara does her show from the next day, hoping to catch Nick before he leaves to go for lunch or something--they’ve got a meeting in a couple hours, but Ian is positive he’ll shake out of his skin if he doesn’t have this discussion as soon as possible.

He’d gone home the night before and ended up lying in bed awake and considering his feelings for most of the night. The way he saw it, his options were A) pretending they didn’t exist, and B) telling Nick they exist and seeing what he said, and Ian is twenty-fucking-seven, all right, and he works in radio. He knows how to use his words.

“Nick,” he says, grabbing his arm as soon as he comes out of the studio. “Can I talk to you for a minute?”

“Yeah, sure,” Nick says, looking quizzically between Ian’s hand on his arm and Ian’s face. “This about the meeting later?”

“Ah, no, nothing like that,” Ian says. He looks around nervously, then pulls Nick over into a corner that pretty much guarantees no one can sneak up on them. 

“Sneaky,” Nick comments. “What’s on your mind?”

“Last night,” Ian says, and Nick’s face falls the slightest bit, “that was like a date. We were basically on a date.”

“It was like hanging out with my friend, really,” Nick says slowly. “You’re really stuck on this dating thing.”

Ian makes a noise of frustration. “Is that all you wanted it to be?” he asks. “Please don’t lie.”

Nick shrugs and avoids Ian’s gaze. “I don’t know.”

“With you, that’s a yes,” Ian says. 

“It’s your fault,” Nick says. “You said you’d pretend to date me, and then you never said no when we kept doing it.”

“That’s because I don’t _want_ to say no.”

Nick blinks. “Like, you mean...”

“I’d like to be dating,” Ian fills in. “If that’s okay.”

Nick stares at him for a never ending moment, and then he breaks into a wide smile. “That’s okay,” he says, and this time when he fists a hand in Ian’s jumper and pulls him in to kiss him, it feels like making something happen rather than just letting it. 

-

When they walk into the meeting later, their hair is still mussed even though they’d attempted to fix their quiffs in the toilets, they’ve accidentally ruined the carpet in yet another corner of Radio 1, and they’re holding hands in the hopes of getting a reaction out of someone. (Which was Nick’s idea, and Ian is feeling way too blissed out to bother arguing about it.)

No one does react, though, save Matt’s raised eyebrow, which Ian assumes Nick will barely even notice, as Matt doesn’t often look at Nick with any other expression. 

They sit down at the table, and Nick conspicuously puts their joined hands on the table top. Ian covers his giggle at Nick’s annoyed face with his hand. 

Matt looks like he’s about to start talking serious business, and Nick huffs a sigh. “Hey, look, Ian and I are holding hands.”

“Yes, I see that,” Matt says. “Can we discuss the new feature, please?”

“Congrats,” Fiona says, and Nick points at her. 

“Fiona gets it. Why are you so cold and unfeeling, Finchy?”

Matt sighs. “It didn’t seem like a big deal.”

LMC snorts. “Did you think they were dating all this time?”

“Are you saying they haven’t been?” Matt asks.

“Of course we haven’t been!” Nick says. “Way to know about your friends’ lives.”

“I don’t blame him,” Fiona says. “You were being pretty stupid about it.” 

She levels her gaze at Ian, and he shrugs at her. “We got there.”

“Can we please stop talking about Ian and Nick’s relationship now?” Matt asks. 

LMC’s phone makes a shutter noise and she studies the screen. “What do you think?” she asks, leaning across the table to show Ian. In the picture, their hands are the most obvious thing, but Nick is making a face at Matt off camera, and Ian is half smiling. 

“Slap a filter on that and it’d look good,” Ian says. 

Nick leans onto his shoulder to look at it. “We look cute. You going to post that?”

LMC shrugs. “Do you want me to?”

Nick glances at Ian, who shrugs at him. “Someday,” Nick says. 

“I’ll email it to you,” LMC says. 

“Meeting? We’re having a meeting? About our radio show?” Matt says.

“Keep your trousers on, Finchy,” Fiona says. 

“Did anyone even read the brief?” Matt asks, looking like he’s about to start pulling his hair out.

“I did,” Ian says, taking pity on him. “We should probably discuss the second paragraph in particular.”

“ _Thank_ you, Ian,” Matt says. “You’re absolutely correct.”

“So cute, reading briefs,” Nick murmurs in Ian’s ear.

“You read them, too,” Ian whispers back.

“Shhhh,” Nick says, and squeezes Ian’s hand. Ian smiles and impulsively leans over to kiss Nick on the cheek. The way Nick's cheeks flush the slightest bit pink and he grins lazily even as he's listening to what Finchy is saying makes it entirely worth it. Really, Ian thinks, that grin is what got him into this.

Thankfully, he still has no regrets.


End file.
